A central Ohio woman accused of drunken driving on a school bus with two young students aboard is serving five days in jail.

Former Columbus bus driver Tia Denton had pleaded guilty to single misdemeanor charges of drunken driving and endangering children. A judge on Tuesday sentenced the 51-year-old Denton to 180 days in jail on each count and suspended all but five days.

Authorities say Denton was driving erratically and had a blood alcohol content that was more than twice the legal limit when she was stopped while driving a bus in November. Denton later resigned.

]]>http://wosu.org/2012/news/2014/02/11/columbus-woman-gets-jail-for-drunken-driving-in-school-bus/feed/0“No Refusal Weekend” in Columbushttp://wosu.org/2012/news/2008/07/02/no-refusal-weekend-in-columbus/
http://wosu.org/2012/news/2008/07/02/no-refusal-weekend-in-columbus/#commentsWed, 02 Jul 2008 00:00:00 +0000Lauren Schmollhttp://wosu.org/2012/news/2008/07/02/no-refusal-weekend-in-columbus/Columbus police plan to spend the holiday weekend cracking down on drunk drivers. From July 3rd through the 5th, police will have extra traffic officers working overtime, and those suspected of driving under the influence may face additional consequences.

“We’re just giving it a try here to see if we can’t help reduce obviously impaired crashes over the holiday weekend,” Ford said.

Jon Saia is an attorney who specializes in DUI cases.

“I think it’s more of a scare tactic,” Saia said. “You know, trying to frighten individuals that you know you’re going to have a needle stuck in you that you could be held down. It’s kind of a scary sequence of events.”

Saia says that while forced blood test are legal, he worries about civil rights issues.

“There’s a case in Nevada where an individual actually died while he was being held down for the police to draw blood,” Saia said. “And at least in Nevada, the court found there was no liability on the police for the death of that individual.”

Jeff Gamso is the legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio. He says he has several concerns when it comes to increased enforcements.

“The danger of this is that they target improperly in selecting who they’re going to be going after,” Gamso said. “The secondary point is that you want to be sure the people that you arrest that you actually have probable cause to arrest.”

But overall, Gamso says stricter inforcement can be a good thing.

“Doing it all properly makes it a legal thing to do,” Gamso said. “The question is do they do it all properly, and if they do, then good for them.”

]]>http://wosu.org/2012/news/2008/07/02/no-refusal-weekend-in-columbus/feed/0drunk,dui,enforcement,holidayColumbus police plan to spend the holiday weekend cracking down on drunk drivers. From July 3rd through the 5th, police will have extra traffic officers working overtime, and those suspected of driving under the influence may face additional consequen...Columbus police plan to spend the holiday weekend cracking down on drunk drivers. From July 3rd through the 5th, police will have extra traffic officers working overtime, and those suspected of driving under the influence may face additional consequences.WOSU Newsno2:00Group says Ohio Sobriety Checkpoints Ineffectivehttp://wosu.org/2012/news/2007/11/19/group-says-ohio-sobriety-checkpoints-ineffective/
http://wosu.org/2012/news/2007/11/19/group-says-ohio-sobriety-checkpoints-ineffective/#commentsMon, 19 Nov 2007 00:00:00 +0000Sam Hendrenhttp://wosu.org/2012/news/2007/11/19/group-says-ohio-sobriety-checkpoints-ineffective/Ohio is one of 40 states that use sobriety checkpoints to screen for drunk drivers. But a group representing the restaurant industry says Ohio's sobriety checkpoints are ineffective. The American Beverage Institute says checkpoints caught fewer than one percent of people driving under the influence. They say saturation or roving police patrols are far more efficient.

]]>Ohio is one of 40 states that use sobriety checkpoints to screen for drunk drivers. But a group representing the restaurant industry says Ohio’s sobriety checkpoints are ineffective. The American Beverage Institute says checkpoints caught fewer than one percent of people driving under the influence. They say saturation or roving police patrols are far more efficient.

The American Beverage Institute analyzed statistics gathered by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Sarah Longwell is the beverage institute’s managing director.

“Only one-third of one percent of drivers stopped at sobriety checkpoints were actually charged with DUIs,” Longwell says. “It hardly justifies the tax dollars spent on them every year.”

Longwell says roving police patrols are 10 times more effective at catching drunk drivers than sobriety checkpoints. She says police have other motivations for the roadblocks.

“Essentially what sobriety checkpoints have become is a cash cow when they write up things like tail lights being out, people improperly buckled,” Longwell says. “Police officers hand out far more of those citations than they do citations for driving under the influence.”

Franklin County’s DUI Task Force director Carl Booth agrees that tickets are more often given for non-drinking violations. As for checkpoints being a cash cow, Booth says officers don’t determine how much in fines checkpoints produce. Each checkpoint costs between $6,000 and $8,000 to operate. Scaled-down, low-manpower checkpoints cost about half as much.

Sarah Longwell says advocacy groups such as Mothers Against Drunk Drivers keep up pressure to keep checkpoints going even though they’re not a deterrent. An official with MADD responds.

“I would adamantly disagree. That’s just a distortion.”

Doug Scoles is the state director of Mothers Against Drunk Drivers.

“One of the main reasons we have sobriety checkpoints is for its deterrence value,” Scoles says. “And that’s been proven over and over by studies by the centers for disease control sobriety checkpoints when they’re publicized and visible are extremely effective.”

The Franklin County DUI task force coordinates 10 to 12 checkpoints a year. The Columbus division of police on the other hand, puts more emphasis on mobile saturation patrols specifically looking for drunk drivers. Again Sarah Longwell.

“They’re actually more effective in getting drunk drivers off the road,” Longwell says. “They’re also less expensive and less time consuming for police officers; not to mention less intrusive to average Americans who drive through the checkpoints.”

A spokesman for the state highway patrol says that of the 26,000 drunk drivers arrested in Ohio last year, most were not caught at sobriety checkpoints. But Lt. Tony Bradshaw says they do play a part in reducing the number of drunk drivers on the state’s roads.

“A large number of OVI arrests should not be anticipated during a checkpoint operation,” Bradshaw says. “What that checkpoint is for is really an education to the public; that we are out there that we are always looking.”

Bradshaw says last year in Ohio more than 450 people were killed in crashes involving drunk drivers.

]]>http://wosu.org/2012/news/2007/11/19/group-says-ohio-sobriety-checkpoints-ineffective/feed/0checkpoint,driving,drunkOhio is one of 40 states that use sobriety checkpoints to screen for drunk drivers. But a group representing the restaurant industry says Ohio's sobriety checkpoints are ineffective. The American Beverage Institute says checkpoints caught fewer than o...Ohio is one of 40 states that use sobriety checkpoints to screen for drunk drivers. But a group representing the restaurant industry says Ohio's sobriety checkpoints are ineffective. The American Beverage Institute says checkpoints caught fewer than one percent of people driving under the influence. They say saturation or roving police patrols are far more efficient.WOSU Newsno3:02Ohio Lawmakers Seek Crackdown on Drunk Drivinghttp://wosu.org/2012/news/2007/07/20/ohio-lawmakers-seek-crackdown-on-drunk-driving/
http://wosu.org/2012/news/2007/07/20/ohio-lawmakers-seek-crackdown-on-drunk-driving/#commentsFri, 20 Jul 2007 00:00:00 +0000Bill Cohenhttp://wosu.org/2012/news/2007/07/20/ohio-lawmakers-seek-crackdown-on-drunk-driving/Ohio legislators are looking at yet another way to crack down on drunk drivers.

Columbus most likely will be a magnet for revelers this weekend. Saint Patrick’s Day will draw crowds to pubs and bars on Saturday. The NCAA play-offs will also add to center-city congestion. Both events may mean more drinking and alcohol-related traffic accidents for law enforcement to deal with.

The day-to-day accidents that drinking drivers cause are already bad enough according to Carl Booth, head of the Franklin County DUI Task Force.

“On average nearly 4 alcohol-related crashes occur in Franklin County on a daily basis,” Booth says. “Yearly we kill 26 people and injure over 800 people in alcohol-related crashes in Franklin County alone.”

To catch drunk drivers this weekend, local police departments will step up enforcement. 22 of Franklin County’s smaller police departments and the Franklin County Sheriff’s Department make up the task force. Its director Carl Booth says he thinks the combination of St. Patrick’s Day and the NCAA basketball tournament this weekend will mean more alcohol-related traffic accidents. That’s why the task force is spending between $8,000 and $10,000 on overtime this weekend. Officers will specifically target drunk, erratic and aggressive drivers through so-called saturation patrols. The Columbus Division of Police will employ its own stepped up enforcement using extra officers on the city’s freeways. Police spokeswoman Amanda Ford.

“Typically they’re easier to patrol in one sense just because people are driving from the suburbs downtown,” Ford says. “Typically that’s where a lot of our impaired drivers are picked up.”

Last year task force participants made 40 St. Patrick’s Day drunk driving arrests; the Columbus police made 20. The state director of Mothers Against Drunk Drivers, Doug Scoles, says some people question how effective these sorts of efforts are.

“They question, ‘Well we only caught so many people,’” says Doug Scoles. “It does a whole lot more to prevent and deter. When you announce we’re going to have stepped up enforcement, we’re going to have sobriety checkpoints, we’re going to be out there looking for drunk drivers, they’ll make plans to have a designated driver. They’ll look for another way home than drive behind the wheel of a car.”

At a Wednesday press conference the task force’s Carl Booth said a sobriety checkpoint would be set up Saturday night on East Main in Whitehall. That’s in spite of a 2004 governor’s task force report that found saturation patrolling more effective.

Booth says the checkpoint will honor Caitlin Leasure, a 20-year-old Otterbein College student who was killed by a drunk driver in Florida one year ago. On Wednesday her sister Nicole read from a statement.

“I pray that someone here today does not rely on the luck of the Irish to bring him or her home safely, she said. “As you take that drink and think about driving, remember my sister Caitlin. Remember the hell my family must now live with. And remember that your choice to be stupid is absolutely dead wrong.”

Columbus police won’t say how many officers will be working overtime this weekend. The task force says it’s paying for 330 hours of overtime for its members. They’ll concentrate enforcement efforts between 7 p.m. and 3 a.m. Friday and Saturday.

]]>http://wosu.org/2012/news/2007/03/15/police-plan-extra-drunk-driving-enforcement-for-st-patricks-day/feed/0Breathalyzer Tests Questioned By Defense Attorneyshttp://wosu.org/2012/news/2006/03/06/breathalyzer-tests-questioned-by-defense-attorneys/
http://wosu.org/2012/news/2006/03/06/breathalyzer-tests-questioned-by-defense-attorneys/#commentsMon, 06 Mar 2006 00:00:00 +0000Mandie Trimblehttp://wosu.org/2012/news/2006/03/06/breathalyzer-tests-questioned-by-defense-attorneys/Prosecutors, judges and juries often use the results of breathazlyzer tests to convict people of driving drunk. But many defense attorneys say the tests are not always reliable.

]]>Prosecutors, judges and juries use the results of breathzalyzer tests to convict people of driving drunk. But many defense attorneys say the tests are not always reliable

Rick, a defense attorney who declined to give his last name was one of dozens, who attended a recent seminar on breath testing. He said he had two cocktails prior to blowing into the machine and was shocked when he saw that his Blood Alcohol Content was above the state’s legal limit of .08. And surprising results such as were frequent during the seminar.

About half a dozen breath test machines sat on table tops next to loaves of Wonder bread, Altoids, Listerine and chewing tobacco. Defense attorneys say these everyday items can influence test results. Columbus attorney Jon Saia had me rinse with Listerine and then take the breath test. The results came back invalid. “As you were blowing into the machine you had so much alcohol in your mouth, or what the machine was reading as alcohol, that the machine shut down and a ticket printed out as an invalid sample. An invalid sample was caused by the fact that you have mouth alcohol, and the reading of your first breath that you blew in was higher than the reading of the amount of alcohol in the breath of your lungs.” explained Saia

Columbus attorney, Eric Yavitch, decided to try his hand at testing out the machine. Yavitch, who weighs 170 pounds, said he drank two bottles of Bass Ale about twenty minutes before the testing.

“The result was .024, significantly below the legal limit. OK, and now what are you about to do? I’m about to put a piece of Wonder bread in my mouth, chew it up a little bit. You going to have me swallow it? To see if the yeast and sugar and the by-products will give off an increased reading of alcohol.” Says Yavitch.

Saia said results after eating Wonder bread are usually similar to the ones after using Listerine: an invalid test or a very high reading. But that didn’t happen this time. In fact, Yavitch’s Blood Alcohol Content decreased.

I tested again after eating one piece of Wonder bread. And the results were like Saia predicted: an invalid test. But no one could explain why my test was invalid while Yavitch’s results were not even affected by the bread. President of the Central Ohio Association for Criminal Defense Attorneys, Richard Piatt, said that’s why the machines should be questioned. “It just goes to show you that these breath test machines may not be a valid as the prosecutors and the police think they are.” Says Piatt.

A breath test instructor and presenter at the seminar, Scott Wonder, has Esophageal Reflux Disease. Wonder said that disorder can cause false readings on a breath test, and he’s been able to prove it when he does not take his medication.

John Fusco’s business, National Patent Analytical Systems Incorporated, makes the machines that are used in Ohio as well as about 22 other states. Fusco said he trusts the technology and he wants to educate attorneys on how the machines work. “It’s better to have well educated defense attorneys. They tend to do things that are not dumb that tend to waste a lot of my time so it’s really kind of self-serving too. The more they know, the better off I am.” Says Fusco.

Attorneys weren’t the only ones learning something at the seminar. Licking County Judge David Branstool said he always thought Breathalyzers were fairly accurate.

“The Truth About Breath Testing” was presented by the D-U-I Committee of the Ohio Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.

]]>http://wosu.org/2012/news/2006/03/06/breathalyzer-tests-questioned-by-defense-attorneys/feed/0Columbus’ First Lady Sentenced in drunk driving casehttp://wosu.org/2012/news/2005/12/21/columbus-first-lady-sentenced-in-drunk-driving-case/
http://wosu.org/2012/news/2005/12/21/columbus-first-lady-sentenced-in-drunk-driving-case/#commentsWed, 21 Dec 2005 00:00:00 +0000Tom Borgerdinghttp://wosu.org/2012/news/2005/12/21/columbus-first-lady-sentenced-in-drunk-driving-case/The wife of Mayor Michael Coleman, Frankie Coleman, pleaded guilty today to a drunk driving charge and was sentenced to three days in jail, fined 250 dollars and given restricted driving privileges. Mrs. Coleman was arrested in October by Bexley Police following an accident on Cassingham Road. A breath test found she had a blood alcohol level of .271.

]]>In court, Mrs. Coleman told Judge Scott Van Der Karr she wants to put the arrest and punishment behind her and get on with her life. “I made a mistake. I have accepted the consequences of my mistake,” Coleman stated.

In addition to the mandatory jail time, Judge Van Der Karr also placed Mrs. Coleman on one year probation. But, Prosecutor Steve McIntosh says its possible probation will be lifted earlier.

As long as she pays her fine and costs, as long as does spend her time in jail, as long as she doesn’t do any similar types of offenses, then she’ll be off of probation in a year or earlier. It is not unusual for defense attorneys to come back once their clients have completed everything and all of the conditions,” McIntosh explained.

After sentencing, Mrs. Coleman and Mayor Michael Coleman declined interviews. Defense attorney Ben Espy told reporters Mrs. Coleman will have limited driving privileges. “She’s allowed to drive occupational driving privileges, like anyone else would get, which we’re going to apply for and the judge is going to sign that. He did impose a three day jail sentence and we hope to accomplish that by the due date of March 24th of next year. And right now, we’re trying to decide where we’re going to satisfy that requirement,” Espy said.

The high profile case was closely monitored by Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD). Spokeswoman Julie Leggett says publicity about the case will help her organization combat drunk driving. “I believe it’s a good thing for MADD because I think that everyone needs to realize that people who get behind the wheel impaired affect all our community, everyone who is out there on the road. And when people are irresponsible no matter what class they come from, it affects everyone that is out driving and it affects far beyond the person that made the irresponsible decision,” Leggett said.

]]>http://wosu.org/2012/news/2005/12/21/columbus-first-lady-sentenced-in-drunk-driving-case/feed/0Lawyers try to keep Frankie Coleman out of jailhttp://wosu.org/2012/news/2005/11/04/lawyers-try-to-keep-frankie-coleman-out-of-jail/
http://wosu.org/2012/news/2005/11/04/lawyers-try-to-keep-frankie-coleman-out-of-jail/#commentsFri, 04 Nov 2005 00:00:00 +0000Sam Hendrenhttp://wosu.org/2012/news/2005/11/04/lawyers-try-to-keep-frankie-coleman-out-of-jail/Attorneys for the wife of Columbus Mayor Coleman say they want to keep their client out of jail. They're questioning the qualifications of the Bexley police officer who gave Frankie Coleman a breathalyzer test last month following a traffic accident. That strategy, according to a Columbus attorney, is a standard defense in drunken driving cases.

]]>Frankie Coleman’s attorney Mark Serrott filed a legal brief that challenges the Bexley police officer’s certification to give Breathalyzer tests. The wife of Columbus’ mayor was charged with drunken driving on October 20th after she hit a parked pickup truck in Bexley. A Columbus attorney who’s a former police officer says Coleman’s lawyers are obligated to provide a thorough defense. Stephen Ames – who is not connected to the case – says that includes determining if the breathalyzer machine was properly calibrated and if the arresting officer was properly trained.

“Why should not Mr. Serrott or any other DUI attorney not question these machines and these procedures? You have an obligation to do that,” Ames says.

Frankie Coleman’s blood-alcohol level tested .271; state law requires drivers with levels of at least .17 or higher to spend at least three days in jail. Coleman’s husband is a democratic candidate for Ohio governor.